Unaffordable and Inadequate Housing:
Unaffordable housing is a matter of great concern in the EU. It leads to homelessness, housing insecurity, financial strain, and inadequate housing. It also prevents young people from leaving their parental home. These problems affect people’s health and well-being, embody unequal living conditions and opportunities, and result in increased healthcare costs, reduced productivity, and environmental damage. This report maps housing problems faced by people in the EU and policies to address them. It draws on evidence from Eurofound’s Living, working, and COVID-19 e-survey, European Union Statistics on Income and Living Conditions, and input from the Network of Eurofound Correspondents.
The United Nations Universal Declaration of Human Rights includes the right to housing. The European Pillar of Social Rights states that access to social housing or housing assistance of good quality is to be provided for those in need. The related European Platform on Combatting Homelessness aims to ensure that no one sleeps rough for lack of emergency accommodation, that no one lives in emergency or transitional accommodation for longer than necessary, that evictions are prevented whenever possible, and that no one is evicted without being offered assistance with finding an appropriate housing solution. According to the European Pillar of Social Rights Action Plan, the implementation of the European Green Deal – first through the initiative ‘A renovation wave for Europe–Greening our buildings, creating jobs, improving lives’–will contribute to alleviating energy poverty and improving housing quality.
The housing situation in Europe will be affected by long-term changes in energy consumption and production arising from the green transition, increased digitalization, and the aging of European societies. The COVID-19 pandemic has made telework more common, meaning that many homes are now also workplaces. The Russian war on Ukraine has created a need to house large numbers of refugees and has driven up utility bills.
Unaffordable housing is a matter of great concern in the EU. It leads to homelessness, housing insecurity, financial strain, and housing inadequacy. It also prevents young people from leaving their parental home. These problems affect people’s health and well-being, embody unequal living conditions and opportunities, and result in increased healthcare costs, reduced productivity, and environmental damage. The housing situation in Europe will be affected by long-term changes in energy consumption and production arising from the green transition, increased digitalization, and the aging of European societies.
In addition, the COVID-19 pandemic has made telework more common, meaning that many homes are now also workplaces. Most recently, the Russian war on Ukraine has created a need to house large numbers of refugees and has driven up utility bills. This report identifies housing problems faced by people in the EU, population groups affected by these problems, and trends over time. Furthermore, it presents examples of policies to address housing problems and looks at the take-up of support measures. Social housing schemes and measures providing support with renting and homeownership are presented.
The report discusses specific policies intended to address housing exclusion, in particular, Housing First-type initiatives targeting homeless people; housing insecurity, in particular measures targeting people at risk of eviction; and housing inadequacy, in particular measures focusing on energy efficiency. The report also outlines how people’s housing preferences have changed and how governments sought to ensure housing security during the pandemic.
National-level information on housing problems and policies was provided by the Network of Eurofound Correspondents between April and September 2022. This information was complemented with desk research by Eurofound. The report also draws on Eurofound’s analyses of EU-wide data sources (mainly European Union Statistics on Income and Living Conditions (EU-SILC) and the spring 2022 round of Eurofound’s Living, working and COVID-19 e-survey) and literature.